The oldest locks to survive from Iran from the Second Millennium BC. So-called Egyptian locks, known from Egypt and Mesopotamia, consisting of a tumbler and a bolt. Often made of wood, these locks were used to secure doors and gates of private houses, but more complex examples were used for tombs and temples. Famously, the tomb of Artaxerxes III (reigned 359 BC – 338 BC) had a great stone door which was locked with a padlock of similar design. However, it was during the Muslim Era that locksmithing became something of a characteristic craft of the Iranians. While simple bolt and tumbler locks in wood remained in use for private houses, the padlocks (qofl-e āviz) of small boxes and Qur’an cases were made increasingly of brass and, eventually, steel. From the Tenth Century AD, the imaginative variety of lock forms increased dramatically, with decorative animal forms becoming increasingly popular. Locksmithing became especially refined under the Safavid Dynasty (AD 1501 – AD 1736); one locksmith, Mawlānā Ostād Nuri Qoflgar, in the mid-Sixteenth Century AD, supposedly created a lock and key so small that they could fit inside a pistachio shell. The importance of locks in Persian society is exemplified by the presence of a locksmith in almost all bazaars (bāzār-e qoflsāzhā) up until the modern era. It was only with the Iranian Revolution of AD 1979, and with the importation of Western machine-made locks in the decade before, that this tradition died out.

One of the most interesting lock-types to emerge from Persia in this period was the adjustable combination lock. Such locks first appeared in the Seljuk Period (Twelfth Century AD), and were an important alternative to traditional locks and keys. Whereas previous padlocks could be opened by anyone with a key – even if they stole the key through nefarious means – or could be picked by someone with the correct tools and expertise, combination locks required knowledge of the combination, safely secure in the owner’s memory rather than publicly accessible. A significant advance in security, combination locks were therefore only used to protect objects of the greatest importance. This adjustable combination lock takes the traditional form. A locking bar is held between two rectangular uprights – each with a trefoil decoration protruding from the side – which also hold in place the mechanism barrel. The barrel itself consists of four independently moving drums, each inscribed with five words in Persian. Each drum of the lock is linked to an internal locking mechanism, consisting of a moveable pin inserted into the central axle. When the drum is turned to the correct position, in other words, turned to the appropriate word in the passphrase, the pin disengages. Once the entire passphrase is correctly positioned, the padlock opens.

The importance of locks and keys in Islam cannot be underestimated. One of the most sacred positions in the entire Muslim faith is that of key-holder to the Ka’ba (sadin), a position held historically by the leader of the Shaybah Tribe. The story goes that the Prophet Muhammad, upon arriving in Mecca at the head of an armed band of followers, demanded the keys to the Ka’ba, the holiest building in the region, in order that he might enter the building. The key, which had ended up in the hands of Uthman bin Talha, chief of the Shaybah tribe, Uthman had escaped to the roof of the Ka’ba, locking himself in. Muhammad’s son in law, Ali, was sent to steal the key from him, scaling the walls of the Ka’ba. Muhammad then entered the sacred building, and performed meditative prayer (salah). During this, a verse of the Qur’an was revealed to the Prophet, through the angel Jibraeel: ‘Allah is commanding you to return the trusts to those to whom they belong’ (4:58). Realising that this meant the trust of the key of the Ka’ba, Muhammad ordered Ali to return the key to Uthman. Muhammad told Uthman that no man would take the key from him, unless he be a tyrant, and as a result, Uthman’s ancestors have held the keys ever since. The keys to locks, then, are sacred trusts, imbued with meaning. Indeed, the Islamic practice of dream interpretation has dozens of meanings of the appearance of keys in dreams: prosperity, knowledge, security, one’s wife, one’s current or future children, orphans – the possibilities are nearly endless.

References: a similar combination lock can be found in Baltimore (Walters Art Museum 54.508).